Ohio Arts Council's Riffe Gallery Exhibition
Masterworks by 20th Century African American Artists
April 16 through June 13, 1998
Curated by Timothy C. Keny, director of the Keny Galleries, Masterworks by 20th Century African American Artists explores the complexity and immense diversity of African American artistic production. Artists featured in the exhibition are Benny Andrews, Romare Bearden, Ralph Bell, William Hawkins, Jacob Lawrence, John B. Murry, Elijah Pierce, Horace Pippin, Mary Tillman Smith, Alma Thomas, Robert Thompson and Bill Traylor.
African American cultural traditions have influenced the visual arts through artistic, spiritual, social, philosophical and political means. Parallels in technique, including exploration of shifting perspectives, simplification of forms and examination and dissection of distance, are important in the evolution of the visual arts.
A few decades ago it was widely held that all connections to Africa had been erased in African American culture through the oppression of slavery and the tyranny of racial prejudice. Since then, scholars have identified adaptations of African form and ideology in artistic practices by people settled far from their ancestral African homelands. Some African American artists have consciously reconstructed their connection to an African ancestral legacy by adopting the images and icons of an African identity for their own artistic, spiritual and political purposes. African American art provides a commentary on the human condition that speaks to all of us through an endless range of emotion, spirituality, intensity and energy.
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How about a quick tour of some of the works that were on display?!?
There are 14 images contained within this archive which are intended for personal/educational use only. These images bear a 1998 photographic copyright which belongs to the Ohio Arts Council and are digitally watermarked. They, therefore, are not in the public domain. Please the contact the Ohio Arts Council directly if you wish to inquire about obtaining reproduction permission.
